Does Anybody Care? With Country in Chaos, Obama Shoots Pool, But Turns Down Doobie

RUSH: Obama was offered some choom out there in wherever. I can't keep up with him. (interruption) He was in Denver? He's out there playing pool. We got a border crisis and he's out there playing pool. Somebody offered him a hit, a doobie. He had to be tempted. You know he had to be tempted. 'Cause he's out there, the last thing this guy can afford to look like is the president right now. He's got to look like anything other than the president in order to stay in tight with the low-information pop culture crowd.

I mean, ladies and gentlemen, that is part and parcel the Limbaugh Theorem. When all of this chaos is visiting the country, he can't act in charge of it. He's gotta act like he's just one of the guys and he's upset by it, too, and this is how he's dealing with it. He's hanging around with the peeps. He's running around shooting pool. He's going to bars. Some loco weed actually offered the president of the United States a hit!

In fact, we have the sound bite. It's the very last one. Grab number nine, it's only three seconds. You're gonna have to listen fast to this. It's in a bar where they sell adult beverages. There's a pool table, and Obama's in there shooting pool. He's relating to the people, and he was asked whether he wanted to smoke marijuana by a fellow patron in the bar.

MAN: Do you want to hit this? (laughter)

RUSH: "Do you want to hit this?" And Obama laughed. Imagine being asked -- well, Clinton, yeah. "Hey, hey, you want to inhale? You want to inhale tonight? Hey, you want to hit this?" Can you imagine? The guy knows, the patron knows, Obama's a choomer. Anyway, folks, you gotta find things to make you smile. You have to find things that you can somewhat chuckle and laugh at. It's what we do here each and every day.

Ted Cruz has -- you know, the big controversy over Obama not going to the border, and a bunch of Democrats are getting really worried about the optics here. They're getting really worried that this is going to be Obama's Katrina moment. Now, to refresh your memory, Bush's Katrina moment was when he flew over New Orleans after the hurricane had gone through there. He was looking out the window of Air Force One and a photographer snapped a picture of Bush looking out the window, flying by New Orleans.

Now, the president said at the time (paraphrasing), "I can't land down there. If I land it's gonna upset everything. It's gonna take people away from their jobs, added security. I'm just gonna get in the way. The protocols of security involving me on the ground make me an intrusion on recovery and other efforts down there."

So he stayed away and they pooh-poohed that and they laughed about that. They said, "That's just Bush being lazy. That's just Bush showing he doesn't really care about people who are suffering. This just shows that Bush would rather just go back to Washington and not even be bothered by it. This is his faux attempt at compassion." And I was watching one of the cable news networks this morning. It was CNN. I know it was CNN 'cause I don't have MSNBC on. Fox is on the lower monitor so it had to be CNN.

Some Democrat strategist: "Obama can't go to the border." It was a woman so I better not talk that way. "Obama can't go to the border. It'd be a security nightmare. If Obama went to the border he'd take everybody away from the very important work they're doing down there. The security detail, he'd gum up the roads and highways because he's president. He can't go."

It was the same excuse that the Bush administration offered but this time it was brilliant; this time it was thoughtful; this time it was compassionate; this time it was the right thing to do. When Bush offered the same explanation, it was arrogance, a lack of compassion, laziness, and what have you. (interruption) Well, see, I think we get caught in a trap here. Snerdley just asked me, "Do you think the pictures of Obama in the pool hall are going to --" did you say hurt or help? (interruption) Help. Help him. Well, they might with somebody.

Looking at it that way, I was in an e-mail back and forth with some friends today and we were talking about a nameless reporter that we used to think was one of us who has now, not gone over to the other side, but has simply become a creature of Washington. And these guys are all complaining about it and mocking the guy's work and saying it used to be worth it but now it's not worth the time. And I said my opinion is that this guy has become totally of Washington, and the thing about that is people who live -- I don't care if you're in the media, if you're a consultant, if you're a lobbyist, a citizen, if you live and work inside Washington, DC, you live in a bubble.

What happens there is looked at through a completely different prism than how people look at life outside Washington. When you're in Washington and when you're working there, everything that happens is judged or viewed through the prism of polling data, electoral politics, the impact on somebody's electoral fortunes, political future, or what have you. There is no concern given, there's no attention given, there's no apparent concern even felt for the real-life circumstances that are going on outside the Beltway.

Now, in this case the question was Obama's impeachment and the reporter was echoing Democrat talking points. "There's nothing there. There's no difference. You don't have any more evidence to impeach Obama than you do Bush." Well, that just sent some of my friends off into -- how do you draw a comparison like that? That's why I told them my opinion is there's a moral equivalent. The two parties are not much different, and everything in Washington is about power sharing. The Republicans win one year, the Democrats win the next, maybe the Democrats win two elections in a row, and everybody spends their time trying to get power away from the people that have it.

But outside it doesn't relate to anything happening in the country. And so, you know, whether or not to impeach Obama is irrelevant, it isn't gonna happen. And Boehner as much as said so this morning today. So the question, "Will the pictures help or hurt Obama?" It doesn't matter. He's not on the ballot anymore.

Now, is there some residual effect that say negative images of Obama in the bar shooting pool and turning down a joint, regretfully turning down joint, is there some carryover to the Democrat Party, does it hurt Democrats? Well, you might be able to make it an argument. I don't know if I'm saying this right. I think that when we focus on is something helping or hurting Obama or helping or hurting Boehner or helping or hurting whatever, I understand it, it matters, don't misunderstand, but it ignores real life. The question is -- and I know this is probably what you meant by asking the question, and I don't mean to nitpick here. When you ask the question, "Does a picture of Obama in a bar help him or hurt him?" you're asking it based on the crisis at the border, what's happening in Iraq, what's happening in Syria and so forth.

The real question to me, though, is what is happening to the country? All of this is hurting the country, in my humble estimation. And in my humble estimate, I am really worried about it. I worry about it 24/7. I go through fits of depression, mild depression over what I think is happening to this country. Now, I may be one of few people that cares as much as I do about it. I don't know. I don't think I'm one of few, but I also know that there are whole lot of people that don't think there's anything abnormal going on at all, it's just cyclical economic times or whatever. But to me they're fundamental, transformational changes being brought about as a result of an assault on the country and its founding. So when you ask me, "Is a picture in a bar gonna hurt Obama?" Does Obama spending time in a bar facilitate the destruction of the country, is the question for me. What the hell is he doing? Does he not care? Can he not even show any concern?